Chicago, March 2004--Denise Duhamel's Barbie doll cavorts through her 1997 volume, Kinky, revealing entirely new possibilities for her plastic body. When Nick Carbó's version of Barbie meets his Secret Asian Man (inspired by the Johnny Rivers song), she says, "Hi there, big guy. I was made in the Philippines. You look like you were made there too." Both playful personae live out fantasies based logically on everyday absurdities. Duhamel and Carbó will read from these and other work at Columbia College Chicago on Monday, April 19, in the Concert Hall, 1014 S. Michigan Avenue. The program begins at 5:30 pm, and is free and open to the public. Please call 312-344-8138 for information.
Duhamel's recent collection is Queen for a Day: Selected and New Poems. Critics have called it "knee-slapping, quasi-existential poetry," "as hard to abandon as a taut thriller," and "somewhere between Sex and the City, Sharon Olds and Spalding Gray." Besides Kinky, her other titles include The Star-Spangled Banner, Girl Soldier, and two volumes co-authored with Maureen Seaton: Oyl, and Exquisite Politics. Widely published and anthologized in more than 50 volumes, her work has won awards from the New York Foundation for the Arts, Poets and Writers' Writers Exchange, and the NEA.
According to Alex Maskara, Carbo "says things that drive nails into the bones." Thomas Fink says Secret Asian Man "marvelously juxtaposes fragments of prurient, poignant erotic dialogue with solemn epistemological discourse." Carbó's El Grupo McDonald's won the Fourth Annual Asian American Literary Award. He has edited three anthologies of Philippine literature: Pinoy Poetics, Babaylan, and Returning a Borrowed Tongue. He has won awards from the National Endowment for the Arts and the New York Foundation for the Arts. Carbó and Duhamel co-edited Sweet Jesus: Poems About the Ultimate Icon. Carbó is Visiting Poet-in-Residence during Spring 2004 at Columbia College Chicago. Duhamel and Carbó are married and live together in Hollywood, Florida.
The Poetry Series, which is sponsored by the English Department of Columbia College Chicago, will culminate with Pulitzer Prize winner Maxine Kumin on Thursday, May 27, Ferguson Theater, 600 S. Michigan Avenue. Contributors to this year's issue of Columbia Poetry Review will read from their work on Thursday, May 20, Ferguson Theater, 600 S. Michigan Avenue. All programs take place at 5:30 p.m. and are free and open to the public.
Media Contact: Micki Leventhal, 312-344-7383